The Weekend That Changed Radio Forever

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I am not sure what you were up to this weekend-- following the end of the U.S. shutdown, reading a book, enjoying a slice of pie. Whatever it was, you may not have noticed that radio changed forever.

Now, there will always be those who need to hear Jimmy Buffett once again, who love their “Margaritaville” and their Classic Rock Radio. I am not here for those people. I am here for folks who feel that their listening experience(s) are lacking something. I want to provide that missing mystery element.

And I want to do so using these 3 free, Public Domain Internet Radio Stations:

Endless Dub Radio-- You may love dub music as I do. What I wanted to do was to lay down a number of beat and basslines, and to allow the computer to select randomly from sets of sounds, looping a set of these sounds over the beats. I call the loop sets “Sessions”, and each has many sounds to choose from. As a result, when you tune in to Endless Dub Radio, you hear fresh version after version of dub-- never the same moment twice. To make things better, and in the spirit of dub music, you can bring the sounds in or out. Certain browsers allow you control the level(s) of each of the embedded players, and all allow you to turn players on or off. Tracks load themselves after each beat segment fades out, so the stream continues to evolve. Participate as much or as little as you choose, Endless Dub Radio is for you, not for profit, or for any commercial interests whatsoever: http://www.thomasparksolutions4.com/

Generative Soundscape Radio-- In a similar spirit, and with a similar functionality, GSR pulls randomly-chosen sets of sounds from particular Sessions. These sounds are soundscape elements. There are no beats with this station, just quiet ambient and drone elements that loop for periods of time and, when the first sound ends, cue a new set of sounds to load. This station has effectively held my interest for hours on end, and I have also managed to sleep while letting it play. Listeners can change sound levels using embedded controls. Generative Soundscape Radio is also not-for-profit, and its code and sounds are available in the Public Domain: http://www.thomasparksolutions.com/

Thomas Park Audio Explorer-- Listening to a radio station compose pieces for you can be cool, as with these first two stations. Sometimes you may want to listen to pre-recorded material. The Audio Explorer is great for this. Where it one-ups conventional radio is that it draws from multiple playlists, each chosen at random. These playlists, in turn, contain as many as thousands of unique tracks. These tracks are all cc-licensed. Listening becomes a process of discovery. Listeners are able to (and encouraged to) download tracks that interest them from the player page. The Audio Explorer was created in order to help adventurous listeners find music they might have missed. It brings no money in for Thomas Park or for anyone, and its components are Public Domain: http://www.thomasparksolutions3.com/

So, while you were eating pie this weekend, can we summarize the main change in radio? It was that, radio was always run by commercial entities, and served other purposes than its listeners. As of now, radio is free, generative, public domain, and created to serve you.